1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to wireless carriers, Internet service providers (ISPs), and information content delivery services/providers. More particularly, it relates to digital messaging services provided between different carriers and/or between subscribers in different air interface standards.
2. Background of Related Art
We are now in what is called the information age. More than ever, the exchange of information, and the ability to do the same, has become an important technical necessity of modern society. With the introduction and now wide usage of the Internet, and the advances in telecommunications, a variety of means for exchanging information have proliferated to bring a great number of people together through the exchange of information.
In the early 1990s, as a result of the growing popularity of digital wireless technology, a standard for digital wireless networks was introduced in Europe. That standard, now known as the global standard for mobiles (GSM), included a service called short messaging service (SMS). One way in which information is exchanged is through short messages. A short message is typically a textual message, e.g., a paging message, e-mail or a voice mail message passed to and/or from various types of communication devices, e.g., cellular telephone handsets, telephones or computers with appropriate modems.
An SMS allows transmission of short messages, typically up to 160 characters, to and from communication devices, e.g., cellular telephone handsets, telephones or computers with appropriate modems. In North America, the SMS is currently implemented on digital wireless/mobile networks, such as a PCS network based on the GSM standard, code division multiple access (CDMA) and/or time division multiple access (TDMA) methods. Short message services are gaining in popularity, particularly in the United States.
Short message services are advantageous over text based paging services because of the capability of bi-directional communication. Such bi-directional communication allows, for example, notification to the originating device of the success or failure of the short message delivery.
Each SMS network typically includes a Short Message Service Center (SMSC) which acts as a store-and-forward mechanism providing guaranteed delivery of short messages to a subscriber, even if the subscriber is inactive when the message was transmitted, by delivering the short messages once the subscriber becomes active. Delivery of all short messages is guaranteed regardless of whether or not the intended subscriber is “on-line” because the transmitted short message is stored within the one SMSC assigned to each intended subscriber, and delivered to the intended subscriber from their assigned SMSC when the subscriber becomes available.
A variety of services have been introduced using SMS networks including, for example, integrated electronic mail and fax, integrated paging, interactive banking, and information services such as stock quotes and airline schedule delivery.
In operation, an SMSC receives a short message from any source intended to be delivered to a particular subscriber. When the intended subscriber is not available because, for example, it is turned off or is outside of the service area of the SMS network, the attempt to deliver the short message at that time will fail. In this case, the short message will be retained in the SMSC assigned to that intended subscriber for a later delivery attempt. Thereafter, when the subscriber finally becomes available, e.g., is turned on or has moved into the service area of the SMS network, the relevant portions of the network (e.g., the mobile servicing center (MSC) and the home location register (HLR)) notify the SMSC to initiate delivery of the stored (i.e., previously failed) short messages.
FIG. 9 shows a general example of a short message exchange network. In particular, in FIG. 9, a text message is communicated between a first communication device (i.e., sender 806) and a second communication device (i.e., recipient 804). The sender 806 accesses a wide area network (WAN) such as the Internet or the Public Telephone Switching Network (PTSN). The short message from the sender 806 via gateway 805 is delivered to the recipient 804 via, e.g., a gateway 802 and a local area network (LAN) and/or wireless network 803.
Although the recipient 804 is shown as being a mobile phone handset, the recipient 804 may comprise, e.g., a computer device connected either through the LAN 803 or via a direct modem connection to the WAN (e.g., PTSN or the Internet) 801.
An example of a wireless short message exchange network is described in co-owned U.S. Pat. No. 6,208,870, entitled “SHORT MESSAGE SERVICE NOTIFICATION IN MULTIPLE SERVICE CENTER SHORT MESSAGE SERVICE NETWORK”, the entirety of which is explicitly incorporated herein by reference.
An SMSC is a core short messaging router, which connects to the SS7 public network. An SMSC provides phone-to-phone two-way messaging within that carrier's network, either mobile originated or mobile terminated. To provide the ability for the SMSC to communicate over the web, a Wireless Internet Gateway (WIG) is added to the carrier's network. While an SMSC does have a direct Internet Protocol (IP) interface (i.e., Short Message Peer-to-Peer (SMPP)), a WIG acts as a multi-protocol router by typically adding, e.g., six or more additional carrier-class interfaces. A WIG provides an IP based door into a carrier's network.
SMPP is typically used to provide direct communications between SMSCs. Other direct communication links used between SMSCs include CDMP, which is MOTOROLA™ proprietary, and OIS, another proprietary protocol.
A suitable and appropriate WIG is shown and described in co-pending U.S. application Ser. No. 09/630,762, entitled “Wireless Internet Gateway”, filed Aug. 2, 2000, the entirety of which is explicitly incorporated herein by reference.
A well known example of a system which delivers short messages is an electronic mail system, commonly referred to as e-mail. E-mail enables a sender to exchange information with a recipient from their respective communication devices, e.g., typically two remotely located computer devices.
Mobile devices such as wireless phones provide limited e-mail services. Wireless phones are designed to accept phone numbers quite easily, but are somewhat cumbersome when required to accept an alphanumeric e-mail address. When communicating between phone on different networks, subscribers must address messages to an e-mail address when communicating from phone-to-phone within the same network, only the phone number is required. Thus, text messages between wireless phones is generally limited in the United States to between subscribers within a common carrier's wireless network.
With current systems, Inter-Carrier e-mail messaging (i.e., between different carrier networks) from wireless devices requires input of a complete e-mail address. In particular, for a subscriber of a first carrier (“Carrier A”) to send a message to a subscriber of another carrier (“Carrier B”), the subscriber of Carrier A must know and input a full e-mail address of the destination device.
Exemplary full e-mail addresses typically comprise a phone number, the “@” sign, and then a unique domain name used specifically for SMS messaging. An exemplary full e-mail address is 4105551234@mobile.myportal.xyzwireless.net. A phone number only experience can be provided to the subscriber of Carrier A only when sending an SMS message (e.g., e-mail) to a subscriber of the same Carrier A.
As an example, mobile terminated short messaging is currently available through web-page based services. For instance, VERIZON WIRELESS™ currently maintains a web page “msg.myvzw.com” for use only by VERIZON WIRELESS™ customers. Using this web page based approach, a user inserts a phone number of a known Verizon customer, types in a body of the desired message, and clicks on an enter key. However, this technique is available for mobile termination (not mobile originated) short messages only. Moreover, the sender must by default know to go to the Verizon web page, and thus have advance knowledge of the particular carrier servicing a particular phone number.
Mobile originated short messaging is also available, but is cumbersome to the user and does not provide a phone number only experience. In particular, to send a mobile originated short message, the sender must enter a phone number in their wireless phone, but the subscriber's network will be capable of sending an associated short message only to other subscriber's within the same carrier's network. To send the short message to a subscriber serviced by another carrier's network, the subscriber must enter a complete alphanumeric e-mail address via their mobile phone (e.g., 4105551212@mobile.att.net). As discussed, entry of a lengthy list of alphanumeric characters via an alphanumeric keypad on a mobile phone is cumbersome at best, particularly since several letters are represented on any particular key, and some letters in the alphabet are not represented at all on the alphanumeric keypad.
Unfortunately, using this mobile originated technique, a sender must know beforehand: (1) Whether or not the subscriber is in fact on another network (thereby requiring a full e-mail address instead of just a phone number for in-carrier subscribers); and (2) The exact format address syntax of a phone number on the recipient's network (e.g., “@mobile.att.net”.
Most carriers in other parts of the world enjoy common technologies with adjacent carriers. For instance, most carriers in Europe have a wireless network conforming to the GSM standards. Accordingly, interconnection between SMSC's from different carriers is simple and straight forward because they all use the same air interface (i.e., GSM). Thus, native SMS Inter-Carrier messaging may be accomplished through direct carrier-to-carrier interconnections. Accordingly, there is no technical barrier to interconnectivity, and a phone number only experience may be provided to these GSM system subscribers using native SMS Inter-Carrier messaging which is accomplished through direct carrier-to-carrier interconnections.
Unfortunately, the interconnection of like air interface technologies (such as GSM) is not generally an option in the US. In the US, each major US carrier has deployed a different, competing air interface technology (e.g., CDMA, TDMA, GSM, I-DEN (a spin-off of GSM, Motorola™ proprietary), Reflex (paging networks), etc.) There are approximately ten (10) different air interface technology protocols currently in use in the United States. While this technology dispersion allows carriers to differentiate their service offers from one another, the US consumer suffers inconvenience because of the lack of standardization and/or interoperability across networks.
Not only is the variety of air interface technologies an integration challenge in the United States (many carriers espouse the superiority of their particular air interface technology over those provided by competitors), but roaming agreements for voice and SMS traffic must be reached by all potential recipients of a short message. In Europe, roaming agreements between European countries are routinely established because of the commonality of the air interface technologies (and lack of ‘technical superiority’ claims by competitors).
Practically speaking, most people remember or note down the mobile phone number of desired people to call. However, most people have no knowledge of the exact carrier with which those desired people to call are serviced by. Without remembering the identity of the person's carrier, a subscriber has great difficulty in determining a full e-mail address for that person. Without changing US society to remember not only phone numbers of others but also which carrier each of the others are with, e-mail messaging between subscribers of different carriers will find adoption to be slow.
There is a need for providing subscribers of wireless carriers in the United States a phone number only experience, to facilitate and ensure the adoption and popularity of SMS messaging in general, and e-mail messaging in particular, in a mobile environment.